Cancer accounts for approximately 13% of all human deaths worldwide each year. Existing dendritic cell-based therapeutic strategies are largely based on ex vivo manipulation of dendritic cells to generate large numbers of cells for activation with cancer antigen isolated from a biopsy of a patient's tumor. Because these ex vivo techniques are invasive and expensive, there is a pressing need to develop dendritic cell-based cancer vaccine strategies that are not dependent on surgical biopsies and ex vivo manipulation of cells.